Ireland’s taoiseach urges Gerry Adams to co-operate with police

Ireland’s prime minister has indicated Dublin will provide no political support for Sinn Féin in its opposition to Gerry Adams’s arrest over the murder of the IRA victim Jean McConville.

The taoiseach, Enda Kenny, said on Friday night he was more concerned about the safety of McConville’s children, some of whom have expressed fears they would be killed if they passed on the names of the IRA unit which they say kidnapped their mother in December 1972.

During the peace process from the IRA ceasefire 20 years ago until the restoration of power-sharing in 2007, successive Irish governments have been accused of secretly urging the British and US administrations to turn a blind eye to continuing republican violence, much of it directed against their own communities in Northern Ireland.

But Kenny called on Adams to provide any information he has about the McConville killling as the former West Belfast MP spends another day in police custody being questioned over the woman’s murder and secret burial during the bloodiest year of the Troubles.

The Police Service of Northern Ireland went to court on Friday to ask a judge to give its detectives an extra 48 hours to hold the Sinn Féin president at the serious crime suite in Antrim police station.